"When the Giants Come to Town..." is my blog intended to chronicle my thoughts on San Francisco Giants baseball. My special interest is in prospects and the farm system, but of course, will comment on all aspects of the San Francisco Giants. I will also comment on baseball in general, particularly from a fantasy baseball perspective. I hope you will find the site informative, and invite you to join in the discussion.

Wednesday, May 16, 2018

Game Wrap 5/16/2018: Reds 6 Giants 3

Someone forgot to tell Andrew Suarez the first inning isn't batting practice. He gave up a 4-spot to the Reds before most of the fans had found their seats. After that, he settled down and pitched a pretty darn good game. Too little, too late. Key Lines:

Gregor Blanco CF- 1 for 3, 2B, BB. BA= .269. Blanco led off the Giants half of the first inning with a double and scored on McCutchen's double to help the Giants cut the Reds lead in half by the end of the first inning. Bochy sent Gorkys Hernandez in to PH for Blanco in the 6'th inning with 2 runners on, 2 outs and lefty Wandy Peralta on the mound.

Andrew McCutchen RF- 1 for 4, 2B, BB. BA= .252. McCutchen doubled in the Giants first run and scored their second in the first inning.

Brandon Belt 1B- 2 for 5, HR(9). BA= .301. Belt went 6 for 13 in the series with 3 HR, one each game and he is probably the hottest hitter in the lineup right now. Well, the other Brandon might have something to say about that!

Kelby Tomlinson SS- 2 for 4. BA= .261. Kelby is hitting .300 over his last 7 games. He is 7 for 17 over his last 4 games as a starter. Kelby is a plucky player! Unfortunately, his hits did not translate into runs in this game.

Jose Valdez RHP- 2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K. ERA= 11.25. Valdez has pretty much eaten innings in garbage time and gotten beat up pretty bad. This line looks more promising and should get him at least another day in the big leagues.

The NL West leading D'Backs lost to the BrewCrew 8-2 so the Giants remain 3.5 games behind them in 3'rd place. The Rockies were were idle so gain 0.5 games to 2 behind in 2'nd place. The big news in the division is the Dodgers lost their 6'th straight, 6-5 to the Marlins and fall into last place by percentage points under the Padres, both 8.5 games behind the leaders. Ha ha! Last Place Dodgers! it sure feels good to write that!

7 comments:

A sweep would have been nice but the Reds were playing good ball. Kiley McDaniel had an interesting chat. He expects Joey Bart to be a fast mover making it to the majors in 2019/2020. So I get excited about the Giants taking Bart. Then he said there is now buzz that the top 3 projection of 1. Mize 2. Bart 3. Bohm could blow up! Very interesting, can't wait for the draft!

Suarez: He kept getting to two strikes then bad things in the first inning... It was painful to watch him struggle to put away batters. I think he just had rookie 'nibbling' issue. Instead of going after the hitters when he had the advantage, he started to nibble and finesse and, eventually, worked himself into a disadvantage. So once the Reds batters had the advantage, they took it.

I think he meant it like their top 3 projected picks in their latest mock draft might not be correct. Hard to say if good or bad. Their #1 pick Auburn pitcher Casey Mize is supposed to be the clear cut #1 pick for the Tigers. If the Tigers were to take Joey Bart instead, then the Giants would have a shot to draft Mize. It depends who you want them to draft.

Game of missed opportunities, lack of bench, absence of Posey, and rigid adherence to L/R ritual all contributed to this embarrassing loss when the Giants had more hits, walks, runners, and bad choices plus a rookie missing 2 chances to score from 3rd.Austin Jackson as a pinch hitter: 35 attempts: .172/.314/.172 with 1 RBI.Gorkys Hernandez as a pinch hitter: 58 attempts: 58 PA: .196/.268/.255Is Pence a better option than Hernandez/Blanco?Is Buster OK after brutal foul tip Tuesday?Big Mac to the rescue? Would Slater have helped?The good news? It's only 1 loss. Again.

As for lead off batters, at this point, Bochy is just being stubborn because he can't be THAT stupid!Blanco is .269/.315/.375 & Hernandez is .264/.293/.347 -- Gorkys last 7 games is .167/.250/.347. Those are BAD numbers for players in the lineup -- for lead off batters, they're horrendous!They both hove .250 OBPs this year leading off -- does Bochy WANT to start 3 of 4 games with an out?Normally, one would think that's stupid, but Bochy isn't stupid.Tomlinson is a LOT better that that, and we won't mention Slater (OBP .500 SSS)!Just because it's the players not the lineups that win games, is that a reason for handicapping them?

About Me

I grew up in Northern California near the Napa Valley. I got interested in baseball and the Giants by listening to Russ Hodges and Lon Simmons broadcast Giants games on KSFO. My early heros were Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Juan Marichal and a guy you don't always think of, Jim Ray Hart. When I got older and was in school and early career, I didn't have time to follow as closely, but I tried to look up their boxscores each day and catch an occasional game on TV. One habit I got into at an early age was looking up the stats of their minor league players in The Sporting News. That became more difficult as TSN moved away from comprehensive baseball coverage. Now, of course, technology and affluence has changed all that. The internet is teaming with farm system/minor league information as well as college and high school baseball. Satellite TV enables me to get most of the Giants games on TV. I'm married with 2 wonderful daughters, who like to watch games with me.